“Armed struggle” against Israel is the majority’s favored option, and practically no one thinks the PA should run Gaza after the war.
By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News
The latest poll by a respected Palestinian center shows that a vast majority of Palestinians support Hamas and an “armed struggle” against Israel rather than a two-state solution with the Palestinian Authority (PA) in charge.
The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that fully 67% of all Palestinians, including 57% in Gaza, think that Hamas was right to invade Israel on October 7.
An even more whopping 75% of respondents were “satisfied” with Hamas’ performance in the ongoing war, including 64% who actually live in the war zone.
Violence was the preferred option for Palestinians in their confrontation with Israel overall.
When asked to choose one of three best ways to establish a Palestinian state, over half (54%) selected “armed struggle,” which is a jump of eight percent from a poll asking the same questions three months ago.
The increased support for war was seen mainly in Gaza, which saw a rise of 17%.
Another 16% chose popular nonviolent resistance, although when asked specifically if this was a good policy to break the political stalemate with Israel, 49% expressed support for this measure.
Only 25% chose “negotiations” as the best way forward.
In general, only a minority (32%) support a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, which is the reason for such negotiations.
It is the only option that the West has backed for the last 50 years.
Over a fifth demand one state of Palestinians and Jews instead, an almost complete nonstarter in Israeli Jewish society, no matter where people are on the political spectrum.
The PA itself is hugely unpopular. While Hamas’ led all political parties with 40% support, Fatah, the primary party of the PA, was far behind at 20%.
A large majority of 63% want to see the PA dissolved, and a whopping 89% would like its 89-year-old president, Mahmoud Abbas, to resign. In Judea and Samaria, the number rose to 94%.
Abbas’ attempt to begin “revitalizing” the PA as the Americans want so that they can support it becoming a state, hasn’t changed Palestinian minds, even if the Biden administration took it as a good sign.
His March appointment of a supposedly technocratic prime minister, Mohammad Mustafa, received good marks from only 9% of the respondents. An overwhelming majority of 72% believe that the new government will not succeed in carrying out reforms such as combatting corruption, or holding legislative and presidential elections for the first time in well over a decade.
A similar percentage does not believe that it will succeed in pushing for reconciliation and unification of the “West Bank” and the Gaza Strip.
All this data seemingly contradicts several of the Biden administration’s most cherished ideas: that the Palestinians want the new PA put in charge of the Gaza Strip as part of a two-state solution favored by the people of the region, and that Hamas and its terrorist tactics does not represent the will of the Palestinian people.
The survey of 1,510 adults was taken between May 26 and June 1, evenly divided between Palestinians in PA-controlled areas in Judea and Samaria, and Gazans in areas where no combat was taken place, mainly in central and southern Gaza, including the humanitarian zones set up by Israel.
Its margin of error was +/-3%.